Happy Easter!

What a weekend! We had a blast this weekend, starting with the Easter Carnival and the Corvallis Country Club on Saturday. Both sets of Grandparents, Mike, Nick, and I and our friends Megan, Kirby and Jeff all attended the event. There was cotton candy which Nick loved, an ice cream station, egg decorating, cookie decorating, face painting, a big bouncy thing, an Easter egg hunt, and of course the Easter Bunny. Nick LOVED - LOVED - LOVED the Easter Bunny. He STALKED the Easter Bunny. The Easter Bunny ran in the opposite direction every time Nick came close to him! It was hilarious! Nick held the Easter Bunny's hand and was not going to let go.
The Easter Egg hunt was cute. The little kids Nicks age started first. Nick picked up two eggs and then decided to give one away in someone else's basket. He liked running around outside better. So much for our practiced Easter egg hunts at home. Then the older kids got to go for the eggs and it was a mad dash! Nick says "happy" but not Easter. So he walked around saying "happy" and after the Easter egg hunt he said "fuuunnn".




Quick! The sun is kinda out! All the blue eyed blonde pasty people squint!

Playing at the Sand's house Saturday evening.

Today, Easter Sunday, we went back to the Corvallis Country Club for their Easter Brunch which was d-e-l-i-c-i-o-u-s! They had a crepe and omelet station, several pastries, fresh fruit, french toast, scrambled eggs (and assorted meat things that you all know I don't care about). It was so good. And guess what? That Easter Bunny came back! And Nick received many hugs from the Bunny. The staff cracked up at Nick's excitement over it.



After brunch we had other places to go and have more fun, but Mike was so stuffed and he parked himself on my parents massage chair while watching the Master's - needless to say, he didn't move for about 4 hours. Speaking of golf - Nick has his first golf clubs, he has a putter, iron and driver. And you can ask him for a specific club and he will get it. I heard Tiger Woods hit his first golf ball at age two, even though he didn't win the Masters today, Tiger still rocks! Nick has been on the course with his Daddy and Grandpa many times. This spring we will have him out even more! Look out Tiger!

Then we finally ended our evening at the Parker house for a wonderful dinner. And I brought ice cream cupcakes from Cold Stone - would highly recommend! Emily kept Nick very entertained by running in circles with him around the house. Nick's shirt was wet with sweat! It was a blast. We are exhausted as I'm sure everyone else feels the same way.

Nick "The Machine" Monroe

Nick is at such a fun age! We can't believe how much he changes from day to day. Our excitement of the day was after swimming class today. Nick is always thirsty and he will sit in the locker room and drink his juice while I get us dried off, dressed and ready to head home. Today he GULPED down his orange juice and swallowed wrong. I could hear the OJ come up and into his nose causing a burning feeling. So Nick became distraught and started gulping down air until he started gagging. Then he had a deep, not great sounding, echo through the locker room gag that resulted in the OJ coming up. And yes, I caught the vomit in my hand....it was that or clean up vomit off his clean outfit I had just put on him. It took him about 5 minutes to settle down and then he just passed out on my shoulder on the way to the car. Poor little guy!

Nick is still obsessed with the Wiggles, his favorite song right now is the "Shimmy Shake" which he pronounces "Shimmy Shit". I keep telling him to say "SHAKE", but he looks at me and says "shit". In his head it must sound like "shake". It's so nice to be able to communicate with him more. I know he's been able to understand us for a long time, but it's so nice to be able to understand him! We've had to give him a couple time outs and we have a chair in the dining room set aside for time outs. Sometimes he wanders in there, sits in the chair and says "time out" even though he's done nothing naughty. He also is into climbing and while he's attempting something "daring and dangerous" he says "CAREFUL". That totally gets us laughing, we don't even have to warn him, he already knows what he's doing is going to end badly!

He continues to crack us up and amaze us daily! He's my little helper in the garden and I can't wait to plant some fruits and veggies with him. Nick also helps me bake, we've made chocolate chip scones several times, which he calls "pizza". I bought broccoli the other day and he got so exited at Safeway he was yelling "broccoli" and had to hold the bag. So I cooked the broccoli up for him and he tried it, got a strange look on his face, spit it out and continued to pick little broccoli bits off his tongue. Well, at least he tried it!

Boots, diaper, robe - I'm all set to play!



Of course one of Nicks favorite toys is a free one. A big box from a Costco shopping trip with a strap tied onto the side so we can pull Nick around the house in the box. He looks like he's going to do a somersault out of the box, but he didn't.


Nick and Yaya reading together. This was so sweet, Mikes mom brought Nick over a couple new books, every time Nick picks up one of those books he says "Yaya".



Nick was quiet the other morning while I was making breakfast. Never a good sign. Mashka was quiet too, so I peeked over the top of the couch to see what was going on only to discover Nick using Mashka as a pillow while he watched the Wiggles. He was perfectly happy and comfortable. Mashka was tolerating him the best she could. She really loves head locks....





Dr. Nick. We all had this mutant virus, it's week 3 I think and we all still have a little cough still hanging on. Anyway, Nick likes to play with the ear thermometer and we got this cute video of Nick playing doctor. I like towards the end when he touches Mikes ear and says "Ew".


Nick loves performing for Yaya. He's into doing the splits. He also likes twirling around until he falls over and says "dizzy", I think Grandma Edwards taught him to do it! My parents watched Nick for a couple hours last weekend so Mike and I could go to a nice dinner out, when we got home Nick was totally sweaty. He and Grandma had been playing soccer for about 30 minutes. He's a little energy machine!


When Nick has his first date, we are so bringing out this video!

I love you!

We finally got Nick to say "I love you" this morning - however, he said it to the cat....Then he hugged her and said "I love Mashka". Mike asked "Do you love Daddy?" and Nick said "No". He's such a twerp!

Nick also can identify all his A B C's and numbers 1-9. It's pretty cool! We went to breakfast last Sunday and he read the prices to me!

Little Fish

Here is Nick's underwater photo taken a couple weeks ago. He loves his swimming class and is doing really well! We'll have him swimming laps in no time!

Baby got back

Remember the jammies Nick had with the drop seat in them? We finally got around to taking pictures of Nick in them without a diaper. I couldn't stop laughing! His butt is soooo cute!

It was really nice it this morning, so we took a walk with Ya Ya and Tia (Grandma Monroe and Aunt Pili).

The Entertainer

Nick has swimming class on every friday. He loves it! Mike took pictures at our last lesson and Nick was in a giggle mood that day. They toddlers all wore flippers in the pool, which wouldn't stay on Nick's feet - he kept saying "oh no!" when he'd lose a flipper. This week we took underwater photos and I'll get a copy of that photo in two weeks at our next class.
Nick doesn't blow bubbles with the water like the other kids do, instead he tries to drink it. Eeeeewww!

Nick turned 1 1/2 on Valentines Day. I couldn't resist this shirt! He is a ladies man! My mom takes Nick to Kindermusik on thursdays and Nick likes Hannah. He smiles at her all during class.






Just being silly





Going for a walk while daddy flies the helicopter






Look up! It's a bird! It's a plane! Well almost...it's a helicopter or as Nick would say "helah"


Mike went to Nicks Kindermusik class yesterday and took some video and pictures of Nick and Grandma (Nick calls her "Amma"). We keep this little guy busy. Wednesdays he now has a class at The Little Gym where he plays on balance beams, sings songs with other kids his age, and gets to tumble around. Thursdays he does Kindermusik with my mom and Fridays we have swimming. He is Mr. Social in all 3 classes, but he is really into Kindermusik. Most of the class they sit in a circle and sing, play different instruments, and then they get up to dance. They pick out two scarves and then they wave the scarves up high then "freeze" and then they wave the scarves low and "freeze". It is hilarious to watch Nick dancing around and then freeze. Nick will stand right infront of Teacher Sue, he studies her intently. They play a song about a dog named Oreo and the kids pass around a big black and white dog that is almost as big as Nick. Here are some photos taken yesterday, Mike said he was cracking up throughout the class watching Nick.

Mr. Clean

Thought I'd send out a couple new photos of Nick Knack. He's growing and changing so much every day. His words are getting clearer and he's definitely letting us know what he does and does not want which is actually very nice. His favorite word right now is "no", but it's not a defiant no. We'll ask what he wants for breakfast and he usually says "cereal" or "saus" for sausage. But if we ask him "do you want cereal?" he says "no" but really does want it.
Yesterday he really had me laughing until I was crying. He started walking on one toe, but the other foot was flat. So he was stepping high then low. And he knew he was being funny so he kept walking like that back and forth in front of me. Then he did it again at my parents house tonight and had us all laughing. He's decided he likes being the center of attention.
Anyway, here are some new pictures and a video.

The double fisted drinker. Milk in one hand, juice in the other. Mommy had a Mai Tai in one hand and Margarita in the other. Mike has a suction cup dart gun that Nick loves. He says "darts" and we shoot the darts to stick to a window, he steals the darts and runs! On this day Mike stuck the darts on Nicks forehead (I promise he didn't shoot Nick in the forehead with the dart gun). Nick was really into fish lips on this day. That's also how he kisses. He was playing the other day and stopped what he was doing, climbed over his stack of books all the while doing fish lips and coming toward me to give me a kiss! See mom, I can hook a big daddy fish! My Uncle Michael and Aunt Nita gave Nick this bubble machine for his birthday. He loves this toy! Mike recently repaired it, as we have worn it out several times. Since it's too cold to play outside, the bubble machine is now a bath toy. Boxes are fun!

This morning I was making cookies and I asked Mike to vacuum. Well, Nick loves to vacuum and he knows where it is. So he went to the closet while making vacuum noises. We keep his little popper in the vacuum closet along with the swiffer. While Mike was vacuuming, so was Nick with his popper. I didn't get the camera out quick enough to get Nick making his vacuum noises, but you can see in the video how he is copying dad.